Thoughts, words, coffee and cake

Some person on reddit

September 25, 2015

I wrote a post recently that got shared quite a bit. The response was well beyond anything I ever expected, and I gained a lot of insight and information from all of the comments left. I was grateful so many people took the time to provide me with information, support and direction, it was a great response.

But at the time all I could focus on was a comment from someone on reddit. I’d written a line saying that I ‘use natural products, I don’t buy supermarket meat, I buy local, I eat healthily’. All of which are true. But this person had highlighted my quote and just written a nice, sarcastic ‘sure‘ to follow.

I am not the most confident of people. So I know, that when faced with a barrage of positivity and one, single negative comment, I’ll focus for days on the negative and forget the rest. That ‘sure’ stuck with me. I immediately edited my original post, changing the words to ‘I try to use natural products…I buy local where I can’. I didn’t want to be judged by anyone, especially when I wasn’t used to such a large volume of people reading and commenting on my writing.

But inevitably, later on I calmed down and thought about it. I do buy local. I do use natural products. I do all the things I wrote. And I was changing my words due to the disbelief of one person who I’d never even met? This person, who could not comprehend that fact that I actually do these things? I didn’t want to dilute my life to conform to some person on reddit’s view.

The more the post got shared, the more nervous I became. The web stats went off the scale and I felt more than a little worried. Dealing with negativity isn’t something I’m good at, and I understand that by blogging, I put out my opinion into the world. My opinion is just that, an opinion, and what makes the world interesting is the wealth of different opinions within it. People filled my comment section with opinions of all sorts and I’m thankful for that. Polite debate, interesting discussion, new links and information to uncover and research. Flat out negativity though, is a different matter.

In the end, I decided that it didn’t matter. I focused on the positives, changed my article back to the original wording, and never looked at reddit again. I was put out that someone could assume I’d lie in a post. I mean, why? But I decided that said more about them than me.

After a while the hype died down somewhat and something else became the new focus. I’m digesting the information I learned from lovely people who took the time to comment from around the world, and taking my own time to think about a new direction, towards positivity and the future.

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About me

Hi everybody, I’m Sal – a 30-something blogger from the UK writing about slow living, nature, books and mental health, whilst attempting to stay uncluttered in a cluttered world…!
I love reading, thunderstorms, wild moorland, music of all forms, being a bit of a hippy, coffee, trees and all of the cake.
Welcome to my blog! Please get in touch (especially if you have cake recipes) by clicking here
I hope you enjoy reading my posts! 🙂 x